School secretaries and caretakers aged 40 or over would receive tax-free lump sums of up to €20,000 under the terms of a Labour Court recommendation intended to resolve a dispute.The issue prompted a strike by members of Fórsa at more than 2,000 schools last September.The proposals, which have been sent to the Department of Education and the union, provide for staff to remain on the auto-enrolment scheme most would have been required to join on January 1st rather than gain the pension parity with teachers and Special Needs Assistants they had been seeking.This is because the court accepted the contention by the Government side that for many staff the benefits of auto-enrolment, when combined with the State pension, would be “comparable” with the benefits of the Single Public Service Pension Scheme (SPSPS). All all new employees of the public service – including the Civil Service, HSE and local authorities – have been enrolled into the SPSPS since January 1st, 2013.However, the court accepted an argument that employees over 40 years of age would not have enough time to achieve comparable benefits and so should be compensated by way of a gratuity.Those older staff would receive between €3,000 and €20,000 under the terms of the proposals as long as they are over 40 and still in their roles on the date an agreement is concluded. With other issues still to be negotiated that means that some school secretaries and caretakers would benefit from the deal because they turned 40 between now and the date it is concluded while other will lose out if they retire between now and then.The proposals are based on the period between May 1st, 2015, and December 31st, 2025.Payments would be made on a pro-rata basis according to what proportion of a full-time post individual staff members works each week and how much service they had during the 10½ year time period. Based on the examples provided in the document, staff might typically expect to receive between €8,000 and €12,000, although the sums would vary from case to case.The calculation of the lump sums is also based on a weekly salary capped at €600 per week, the amount on which statutory redundancy entitlements are calculated. Some of the gratuities would be larger by the time individuals retire if that figure has been increased by then.Such an increase has been sought by trade unions in recent years with the €600 figure set more than 20 years ago. There has been no suggestion from Government one is imminent.The terms of the SPSPS, which was introduced as a cost-cutting measure during a period of austerity, has repeatedly been criticised by public sector unions as providing inadequate benefits for their members. Those unions are likely to seize on the suggestion that for many staff, particularly younger public servants embarking on their career, the benefits are only comparable to those of the MyFutureFund, or auto-enrolment, scheme.The court’s conclusions on the issue followed presentations by pension experts representing both sides, with those on the union side arguing the benefits were not comparable while those for the Government argued that when combined with the State pension, they were.Despite falling short of what was being sought at the time of the strike and what it subsequently felt had been promised at the time it was suspended, the union welcomed the proposals on Monday.Fórsa’s head of education, Andy Pike, said the recommendation represented “a very significant development” in what had been a long-running dispute“This is the first time a clear and workable pathway has been set out to address the historic exclusion of school secretaries and caretakers from comparable pension arrangements.“It has the potential to bring an end to more than 40 years of inequality for a workforce that has been essential to the functioning of our schools,” he said.The union’s branches in the sector are to consider the recommendation, it says, while talks on other aspects of a final deal continue.